


caught in the cold

by bardicaberration



Series: winter prompt challenge [5]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Cold Weather, F/M, Huddling For Warmth
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-06
Updated: 2020-12-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:08:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,575
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27923563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bardicaberration/pseuds/bardicaberration
Summary: “Geralt.” She turned on her heel, pacing from the mouth of the cave to the rocky outcrop under which Geralt sat, building a fire, and back again. Geralt beamed and Yen scowled, desperately wishing to curse the smug look off his face.“Ah! So you’re speaking to me again.”“I’m not.”“Sounds like you are.”“If you say one more word, Geralt, one more word, I will curse you so hard you wish you’d never been born.”
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Series: winter prompt challenge [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2041406
Comments: 1
Kudos: 26





	caught in the cold

**Author's Note:**

> day six of the [winter prompt challenge](https://witcher-and-his-bard.tumblr.com/post/634710612632551424/winter-prompt-challenge-i-wanted-to-make-a): hypothermia/frostbite. 
> 
> It took a bit of a left turn, but boy is it Soft. 
> 
> quick additional content warning in the end notes.

Yennefer swore loudly and kicked a clump of snow. It exploded in a puff of soft powder and a strangled noise escaped her throat. Geralt chuckled softly behind her and she rounded on him, violet eyes blazing.

“Yennefer.”

“Geralt.” She turned on her heel, pacing from the mouth of the cave to the rocky outcrop under which Geralt sat, building a fire, and back again. Geralt beamed and Yen scowled, desperately wishing to curse the smug look off his face.

“Ah! So you’re speaking to me again.”

“I’m not.”

“Sounds like you are.”

“If you say one more word, Geralt, _one more word,_ I will curse you so hard you wish you’d never been born.”

He considered this, cocking his head. In his younger days, he supposed, he may have gone in for that sort of thing. Being abandoned on the side of the road and picked up by a Witcher, then trained and mutated and honed into a killing machine with no choice in the matter, could do that to a man. Since he’d met Yen though, those feelings had faded and rarely even registered as a quiet hum. He was, in a word, content. The thought still surprised him sometimes.

His thoughts must have shown on his face, he realized, or else Yennefer was reading his mind again. She kicked another clump of snow, more furiously than the last, and growled at him.

“You sound like Lambert,” he said patiently.

She snorted. “Is that supposed to be a compliment?”

He shrugged. “No.”

Silence fell heavy inside the cave. The wind howled outside the snow fell harder. By Geralt’s best estimation, they were stuck until tomorrow morning at the earliest. Yennefer rounded on him, mouth curled into a snarl; she was definitely reading his mind again. Geralt leaned back against the wall, smug.

“Don’t read my mind and you won’t see things you don’t want to see.”

A particularly foul gust of wind blew across the mouth of the cave. Yennefer’s fur-lined cloak rippled and despite her best efforts, she shivered violently. Geralt pushed himself off the wall and crouched above the pile of kindling he’d gathered. It was meager—they were in a cave, after all, not a forest ( _thank god,_ he thought, casting a wary eye at the snow outside)—but he’d make do. A quick burst of igni lit the wood and a merry fire crackled where he knelt.

“Yennefer.” She grunted, turning to face him. Her arms were crossed and her face was rigid with frustration, but he saw the fine shiver running through her body. “Come here.” They stared at each other for a long moment, the silence stretching between her. She was so stubborn, sometimes, loathe to accept help when she was so used to simply doing things herself. Geralt would never begrudge her that independence; certainly, he understood the importance of choice when choice had been stripped from them both so young. But he also spent far more time roughing it and knew if she didn’t warm up now, she might never.

Yennefer sighed loudly and stomped across the cave to sit, landing heavily next to Geralt. He rifled through his pack, odds and ends littering the floor around him. Empty vials, decoctions, monster parts… Finally, he removed a wrapped parcel and held it aloft, eyes glittering triumphantly. “Aha!”

“No,” said Yen. “I will not.”

She did, Geralt was pleased to see. He’d warmed the strips of dried meat as best he could over their small fire. It wasn’t much, but it was better than starving. He’d learned that the hard way, forced into starvation on the Path when coin was light and monsters few and far between. He’d shoved the larger portion at Yennefer, who held up the stick and glared at it, as if she could frighten it into transforming into something more edible. Geralt laughed softly and imagined the possibilities. A pie, he thought, or a trencher of stew, a thick slide of fresh bread, warm and slathered with honey and butter…

“Not helping,” Yen scoffed. It came out garbled; she spoke around the hunk of dried beef in her mouth and Geralt smiled as she swallowed and brushed away invisible crumbs. Her face softened. “I’ll find you the biggest stew I can when we get out of here,” she mumbled. “Even though you got us into this mess in the first place.”

Geralt hummed under his breath. They had met up by chance: Geralt, in the middle of a particularly perplexing contract and Yennefer on an errand for the Lodge. _Or perhaps it was destiny,_ Geralt corrected himself; she was a fickle mistress, after all. They’d reunited at the Inn at the Crossroads. He’d been halfway through a pint of ale—or what passed for a pint of ale in these parts of Velen—when she blew through the door, literally, a gust of strong wind shaking the building behind her. She’d been surprised to see him, but not displeased, and the ale was quickly abandoned in favor of absconding together to Geralt’s room, where they passed several hours in a haze of pleasure, each relearning the contours of the other.

Finally sated, dinner was called for and Geralt detailed the contract he’d undertaken. A local minor noble—extremely minor, he added—had been loosing workers left and right. For months, they’d been disappearing, sometimes several at once, sometimes none for several weeks. A monster was suspected, but privately, Geralt assumed they had simply had enough; times might be hard, but the pay was shit and the noble cruel. Surely skilled laborers were more valued in Novigrad. But coin was tight and Geralt had accepted the contact, reluctantly agreeing to look into it.

Yennefer, he learned, was on business for the Lodge. A mage named Izohr had recently gone rouge, destroying a large land holding owned by a minor noble—extremely minor, she added—and disappearing without a trace. Privately, Yennefer assumed that the mage was likely dead by now; they had experimented with magic, pushed the edges of chaos and had simply broken. But Yennefer was intrigued, reluctantly agreeing to look into it.

And here they were, sated and fed and as they looked at each other both Geralt’s perplexing contract and Yennefer’s errand for the Lodge each resolved themselves and they laughed at the simplicity and fell into each other once more, agreeing to set out the following morning.

They set out on foot before dawn, Geralt fondly patting Roach on the nose before departing, and walked for several hours. Their combined efforts led them south, the sky clouding over as they climbed a rocky hill. Traces of magic littered the area and as they climbed further, it began to snow. Geralt had insisted they stop, leading them into a shallow cave and settling in to wait out the storm. He’d pulled her into the cave and kissed her fiercely, hot tongue licking into her open mouth, and she’d wrapped her hands around his neck, realizing the real reason he’d pushed for a break.

A short time passed—or so Yen thought, it felt like hours, or maybe days—and she rolled off of Geralt, not quite satisfied but thoroughly pleased and no longer thrumming with an undercurrent of desire. He lay panting beside her and she dipped into his mind, grinning wickedly as he thought about the things they’d do when they returned to the inn.

And then the wind howled outside and the snow began to fall in earnest and, Yennefer realized, they were trapped in this cave until at least the next morning.

Geralt dug through his pack again and pulled out a bread roll. He held it at eye level, surveying it critically, and—after discarding a small piece of lint—offered it to Yennefer. It was a peace offering, she knew. He had gotten them stuck in this cave for good reason, after all, although she would much rather be luxuriating in a large bed, surrounded by feather pillows and soft blankets with a very naked Geralt, pliant and yielding beneath her. She shivered—pleasantly this time—and wished fervently he could dip into her own mind and see this, only this, and understand the ways in which she longed to make him come undone.

Roll tucked away, Yennefer pulled her fur-lined cloak around her and turned to Geralt. She gestured for him to come closer and he obliged, shuffling toward her. Their shoulders bumped against each other companionably and they sat for a moment, quietly watching the mouth of the cave as the sky outside grew dark.

Silently, Geralt dug his wineskin out of his pack. He offered it to Yen, a silent peace offering, and she accepted, the last of her anger burning away, washed down with the pleasant red inside.

“That’s swill,” she said, a teasing note in her voice. She felt, more than heard, the satisfied grumble emanating from Geralt’s chest. She grabbed his cloak and tugged gently, pulling them both to the hard stone floor. They faced each other, nose to nose, and she carefully arranged their limbs to her liking. A fine shiver ran through them both, neither quite sure if it was the cold or the contact or both. She tucked her hands between their bodies and Geralt squeezed gently where his arms encircled her. He tucked his cold nose against her forehead and she closed her eyes, content.

**Author's Note:**

> content warning: In response to Yen's threat to curse him out of existence, he thinks back to a time before he met Yen when he may have been okay with not existing or having never been born. 
> 
> also on [the tumbl](https://bardicaberration.tumblr.com/).


End file.
